The heat that radiated off the lava covering the world of Mustafar was already enough to make the temperatures unbearably hot. Yet it shouldn't have made the air so sweltering as to heat up the metal of the shielded facility to the point it burned skin—lightly, thankfully. Nothing scarring had occurred, not yet, anyway. Something was wrong if the temperature had spiked to the degree of burning, as even the air caused skin to dry and lips to crack.

The heat was the first sensation that returned to her. This unbearable heat that seared her skin and made her eyes sting as what little sweat she had beaded over her eyelids and managed to slip beneath loosely-closed lids.

The next was the pain. There were the small things: cuts from glass, bruises from impacts, the burn of the heat that was getting steadily worse, a pounding headache that made it difficult to focus. Then there were the larger things: the burns and cuts from a lightsaber, the small layer that had been sheered from her shoulder, and her entire body seemed to throb and hum with pain.

She twitched, ears picking up the sound of blaring alarms, a sound that grew steadily in strength as she returned to consciousness. She wanted to move, to figure out what that sound was and to escape the heat boiling her skin, but she was in so much pain...

She managed to open her eyes first. She squeezed them shut again a few times as the little sweat she'd generated burned her eyes before the blurry red, orange, and grey world around her slowly came into focus—for the most part. Her vision still swam enough to make her feel unbalanced, and it seemed like the floor was tilted.

No...no, it really was tilted! As she managed to lift her head marginally from the ground, it was to discover that there was lava slowly devouring the room that had once been part of a shielded facility. As she came to the jarring realization that the room she was in—she couldn't say it was the whole building because she'd only just regained consciousness—was sliding into the lava of Mustafar, she registered a metallic rolling sound that seemed vaguely familiar. One arm swung jerkily out on instinct, and something cylindrical stopped rolling across the floor as it came into contact with her hand.

Move.

She tried to push onto her arms, but her limbs didn't want to cooperate, even as she saw the lava creeping closer. Anything she started to put weight on trembled and buckled, everything tilted and swam as her mind sluggishly tried to make sense of what was going on.

Move!

Her fingers curled around the cylindrical object she'd stopped from rolling across the floor as she tried again to push herself up, much slower this time. She wavered unsteadily even though she was hardly lifting herself off the floor, her stomach lurching violently and causing a raspy retch as her stomach tried to expel contents that weren't there. Again, she found herself on the burning floor, unable to gather enough sense of herself and her surroundings to even raise herself marginally off the floor.

She dimly realized that she was lying on another cylindrical object that was pressing uncomfortably into her abdomen, but her mind was more focused on the connection she'd just made.

Growing up on Tatooine, one of the first planetary survival lessons that had been engrained into her were heat related illnesses. As a result, she recognized heatstroke even in her disoriented state.

I can't get up...I don't have the strength, the ability, I can't...

Yet she could feel the burning of the lava getting close. The facility was sinking, and she had to get up and move.

Still, she couldn't even get her arms to cooperate. It was hopeless. She couldn't get herself to move to safety, no matter how hard she tried.

Please! You have to stand...I ask nothing more of you beyond that other than that you live.

Zelina closed her eyes as the words Luke had said to her another day she'd been unable to find the strength to stand reverberated in her mind. She remembered the desperation in his voice, the raw plea that she live, that she survive, how he'd begged her to stand...

Gathering all the strength she had in her drained body, Zelina reached out to her constant companion, the Force, and pulled on it for strength, sliding her hands against the burning metal floor and under her body before she pushed up, watching her arms shake.

The limbs almost collapsed again when she saw the lightsaber in her hand, the one that had stopped the rolling object.

It was Anakin's. Anakin's lightsaber had been rolling forgotten along the floor of the sinking facility.

Panic gripped her as the worst possibly whys flashed through her mind, giving her a sudden burst of energy to at least push herself back a little further from the lava that was consuming the room and to push herself up a little more. Another lightsaber rolled out from under her, this time her own—the one she had constructed as a Padawan. She grabbed it, too, before it could fall into the lava, letting Luke's words from another time loop through her mind as her push to keep moving.

You have to stand...you have to stand...live...

After a few blind movements to hook the two lightsabers to her belt, she pulled herself across the floor at first, struggling to get her knees underneath herself as she worked her way in the opposite direction of the lava. Her vision was shifting in and out of focus, a further testament to just how injured she was and how serious her case of heatstroke seemed to be. She worked with what she had, though, letting Luke's words and her own mantra of get up, move cycle through her head as her motivation. She could see her target, a doorway that seemed to have broken away from another section of the facility and now led to the rocky shores of the river of lava her room was sinking into. She only had a small window of time before it too would be submerged, and in her current state of being, she would be doomed.

Now she was on her hands and knees, crawling towards the doorway as the floor continued to tip, making it harder and harder to find enough purchase on the floor to avoid sliding backwards. Her breaths came in short bursts from the raw strain and exertion the simple action was causing her damaged body...

Her hand found the edge of the section that had broken away from the crumbling facility, telling her she'd reached the doorway. Slowly, painfully, Zelina pulled herself up, trying to make it out of the room. The floor seemed to shudder before the entire room lurched, tipping back further as it sank deeper into the lava that was eating the metal room just behind her.

Get out! Now!

With a rasping cry, Zelina forced her strained muscles to heave her body halfway out of the doorway, midriff balancing on the jagged metal edge as she focused on the shore that was about to slip out of reach. Before she could doubt or miss her chance, she simply pitched herself forward, landing hard enough on her back that the breath rushed out of her when she collided with the rocky shore. She could hear groaning metal behind her as the room continued to sink, a sound that mostly covered her choking gasps for air as she lay prone on the ground, trying to regather her bearings.

There, she was out of immediate danger. Perhaps now...now she could...

No...no, she was suffering from heatstroke, she could die if she didn't cool down and receive medical attention now. She was still too close to the lava river. Up above her she could see the jagged rooms of the once whole facility that now seemed to be slowly breaking apart and falling into the river below, no shields activated to protect the metal structure from the spewing lava.

She didn't want to go there, then.

...the sound of an explosion, two presences snuffed dim, "NO!"

Zelina's head jerked up at the shock of the memory, a gurgled grunt bursting past her lips at the sudden movement.

Obi-Wan...Padmé...

The landing platform was exactly where she needed to go. Their presences had only been snuffed dim, not completely out. There was a chance, a chance that they might still be alive.

But that also meant she had to climb and get back to the landing platform before the rest of the facility crumbled into the lava.

It was a little easier for her to roll onto her side and flop to the ground on her stomach than it had been to crawl out of the sinking room. Every moment she spent pushing her body—to take one more step, drag her just a little farther, cover a bit more distance—was more pain that she had to suffer through. Now, though...now she needed to stand—to walk and to climb.

Hands sinking into the black shores around her, Zelina focused her entire being on making her way up the slope, burning eyes focused on the facility above her as she made painfully slow progress upwards. Her limbs shook, her body swayed from side to side, and once or twice she slid backwards down the slope when she failed to find purchase on the crumbling ground beneath her.

Forward.

When the black grained surface beneath her palms switched to smooth metal, Zelina sighed in relief, reaching out for the nearest wall at her side to start to pull herself up. It took far longer than she wanted to admit to pull herself into an upright position, but she did, though she continued down the hall hunched over and leaning against the wall for support.

Am I even going the right way?

The thought was hard to avoid, especially as the world seemed to swirl around her on uneven ground, her disorientation making it hard to tell the right direction. A part of her prompted her to keep walking, though, and she knew to listen to that part more than to trust her own senses.

She almost tripped on a few bodies along the way, and the fuzzy memory of her realization Anakin had carried out a slaughter here floated to the front of her mind.

Anakin...

No, no, don't even think that. He's alive, he has to be.

...but if he was alive, would he have left her to perish from the lava? Wouldn't he have come to rescue her, as she had rescued him before, as he had done for her in the past?

Don't, she thought with a deceitful firmness, her free hand resting on Anakin's lightsaber clipped to her belt. Don't go there.

A blast of warm—probably hot, but only warm to her skin after being so close to the lava—air blasted against Zelina's face, whipping her disheveled hair from her face and turning her attention to the entrance in front of her. She hadn't even realized she'd already reached the landing platform.

Doeep!

The familiar tootle turned Zelina's attention to her side, where the familiar sights of Threepio and R2D2 brought a small dose of comfort to the current situation. They hadn't been on the ship, then...

"Mistress Zelina! My goodness, you're alive!" Threepio started to exclaim before Artoo bumped him a little aggressively, like he was trying to get the other droid to quiet.

Was there danger nearby?

After a few rapid blinks, Zelina attempted to reorient herself, looking away from the two droids standing on the other side of the hallway to instead peer out at the landing platform.

The explosion from earlier had left its mark on the platform, scorch marks and shrapnel from the Nabooian vessel littering the ground as testament to what had happened. One look at the vessel now damaged beyond repair told Zelina the bomb had been on the ship itself, likely planted while the rest of their group had tried to make their way towards it or talked. And just a short distance away from what had once been the landing ramp...

Zelina choked back a cry of distress, though she wasn't entirely sure why she was trying to be quiet. Padmé and Obi-Wan both lay unmoving on the ground. She was close enough to see their clothes were scorched, but she couldn't see the extent of their injuries, or if they were even still breathing.

Threepio was trying to talk to her again, but there was a ringing in her ears, and she wasn't really paying any attention to the droids at the moment—they seemed fine, so all of her concern was on her two injured and possibly dead or dying friends a few meters away. She lurched forward with a disregard for caution that would have her alert, general self yelling at her in frustration.

Almost instantly, a blaster bolt whizzed past her head, close enough to her left eye the brightness temporarily blinded her, though she'd already jerked back into the cover of the hallway on instinct. A brief volley of blaster bolts slammed into the doorframe and a little ways into the hall, forcing her deeper back into the facility.

There must have been soldiers left on the platform. Probably meant to remain long enough to make sure there weren't any survivors.

Zelina's hand dropped to her lightsaber as a fresh wave of hatred for Palpatine swept through her, fueling her actions long enough to unclip and raise her lightsaber to a loose ready position, blade not yet activated as she tried to assess her current situation.

She doubted she was in a healthy enough state to take on a well-organized and possibly fresh batch of soldiers. Right now she was easy pickings, mere target practice for a trained soldier.

She needed help.

Praying she hadn't lost it in the fight, Zelina searched her utility belt for the comm unit that would put her in touch with the 105th that was—hopefully—still waiting for a signal to swoop in if things got hairy.

Sticking with the analogy, she figured thing's had escalated to a Wookiee-sized situation.

She didn't know if her voice even worked, and she didn't think she even had time to explain the situation, so she simply pressed the alert button so Cruiser could ping her location. Blaster bolts struck deeper into the hall, telling her the soldiers outside had changed positions and were moving to get a clear shot of her, which prompted her to pull deeper into the facility.

No point in trying to hide, now. They would be on her in minutes.

She activated her lightsaber, the violet blade casting the hallway in a harsh glow, illuminating the blaster scorch marks and some blackened, crumbled shards of metal that had flown into the hallway when the blast went off. She could hear shouts outside, no doubt the soldiers warning one another that it seemed a Jedi was inside and to prepare themselves.

The facility shuddered beneath Zelina's feet, a violent groan piercing through even her disoriented state as the section of the facility she was in—landing platform included—cracked and began to lean right, towards the lava river below. Zelina's gaze immediately snapped towards the two prone figures who were lying unprotected on the landing platform. If the facility tilted too much, they would slide over the edge and into the lava below—then they would definitely be dead, if they weren't already.

Switching which hand was holding her lightsaber, Zelina took a shaking breath and braced herself against the wall, counting in her head before she threw herself forward, gaze locked on a supply crate that was relatively close to the entrance and large enough to use for cover. Blaster fire ripped through the air as soon as she emerged, most coming dangerously close, one striking her leg and causing her to crumple, but thankfully she'd already reached the crate by then.

She collapsed against the metal ground with a cry, the impact rippling through her battered and frankly destroyed system, and she struggled to control her breathing.

She wasn't going to make it to Padmé and Obi-Wan. She was too injured, and there were too many soldiers. She couldn't fight them off.

I think I'd rather have died while I was still unconscious than like this.

There was shouting again, much closer this time, but between her damaged eardrums, her disorientation, and the cacophony that was multiple voices yelling all at once, she couldn't make out what they were saying. She just knew that it was the familiar sound of soldiers shouting in the heat of battle.

Furious blasterfire ripped through the air, but none of it came her way or sailed over the crate—not on purpose, anyway. Zelina remained hunkered down, refusing to rise and make herself an easier target. If she had any luck left, the 105th would arrive before she became target practice, though considering how everything else had gone down, she doubted she was that lucky.

Silence suddenly settled over the platform, ominous and heavy, before it was pierced by the distinct sound of footsteps hurrying towards her. Latching onto adrenaline for her source of energy, she flipped around so she was lying on her back, lightsaber ignited and held in front of her defensively as two soldiers in white and blue armor appeared around the corner, ripping off their helmets as they came in view.

"General!" one of them exclaimed while the other carelessly tossed the helmet to the ground, both of them holding up their hands to show they weren't a threat.

In her current state, it took Zelina a moment to recognize them, but when she did, she felt tears of relief prick her eyes and threaten to spill over. "Echo...Jesse..." she croaked. The sound of her voice was terrifying—she hardly recognized herself.

As she deactivated her lightsaber, the two 501st members dropped down beside her to start examining injuries, their words reaching her in a disorganized mess. It didn't take a genius to guess they were asking about her injuries and what had happened, or explaining themselves.

"Heatstroke...lightsaber fight...elec...electrocuted," Zelina mumbled in way of explanation, hoping they would realize she wasn't all there and couldn't entirely answer them at the moment. "105th enroute..."

Zelina was already trying to push herself up, to force herself to crawl towards Padmé and Obi-Wan, but Jesse and Echo stopped her.

"Ma'am, you shouldn't move, you're in really bad shape—" Echo started to say, but Zelina batted their hands aside, continuing her push to reach Padmé and Obi-Wan. Seeing her stubbornness come out, Echo and Jesse reluctantly helped Zelina up enough to bring her over to Padmé and Obi-Wan.

Obi-Wan was closest, so Zelina checked him first, vision swimming as she turned him just enough to see that the worst of the damage he'd taken had come from behind, indicating the blast had come from behind him. There were shrapnel wounds, and a cut on his forehead that left a large trail of blood down the side of his face...

...but a quick check for his pulse told her that yes, he was still alive.

One miracle. Let's hope that two isn't asking too much.

Padmé was in far worse shape. It seemed she was the one who had been caught in the blast, and Zelina immediately feared not only for Padmé's life, but for the life of her child. Padmé's shrapnel wounds were far more numerous than Obi-Wan's, and she'd suffered several severe burns. If she'd been as close to the blast as these injuries suggested, then the blast itself could have...could have done some internal damages.

Zelina's hand dropped to Padmé's abdomen as she sent out a brief prayer that the child within would live before she checked for Padmé's pulse.

Faint...but there. They might all survive, yet.

"Help me with them," she rasped to her two companions, uncaring of how weak and vulnerable she must have seemed to them. Her energy was seeping out of her again now that she'd reached the platform and Obi-Wan and Padmé were both confirmed to still be alive.

"General—"

"This place...is falling apart. Get them off this platform, now," Zelina rasped. She saw Echo move to pick up Padmé, and she turned to see Jesse hefting Obi-Wan up as she pushed herself up onto her elbows, breathing labored from the effort. The two 501st members carried Obi-Wan and Padmé away from the landing platform and closer to safety while Zelina tried to reorient herself once more. This time, it wasn't happening. She could feel reality fading around her again, and she struggled to hold herself to the realm of the living.

After a few moments of labored breathing, feeling the landing pad continue to tremble and tilt beneath her and the facility groan, Zelina felt strong hands grasp her under her arms, hefting her up and draping her arms over their shoulders to drag her forwards. She hardly even registered what was happening around her anymore, barely managing to assist Jesse and Echo's attempts to move her by not being completely dead weight, thoughts quickly falling into shadow.

Padmé was barely alive, and if she couldn't hold on until they could get help...

I'm scared...it's so cold...don't let it take me, please! Don't let me die! Father, please!

Anakin's lightsaber rolling forgotten and abandoned across the metal floor towards the lava below, the screams and shouts and lightning and sounds of lightsabers clashing against one another...Anakin would have never willingly left his pregnant wife abandoned and dying on this Force-forsaken planet. He wouldn't have left them all to die, wouldn't have left unarmed, but that meant he had to have...the fight had to have ended with...

As Jesse and Echo finally came to a stop, Zelina sank to the ground beside Padmé, laying over her friend and trying to hold back the waves of grief threatening to slam into her during what may have been her weakest point. She could feel a few sparse tears streaking down her face, burning as they mixed with the soot from the explosion all over Padmé's clothes.

The overwhelming sound of a Republic Gunship reached her ears, and Zelina looked up as a spotlight washed over the five of them, casting her distress in a bright light for all to see.

"Wait for us!" came the distant voice of Threepio behind them, but Zelina didn't bother to turn—she knew the droids would reach them in time. She was focused on the 105th she could see sliding down cables with medical gurneys being handed down once it was clear three of them were injured. Her men were surrounding her in an instant, Obi-Wan, Zelina, and Padmé all being lifted into gurneys that were sent up into the gunship.

It was too much stress. Even as she registered that the arrival of her men also meant she was officially safe, all the what ifs and unanswered questions, the glaring possibility of Anakin's fate, the fact Padmé might not survive and Luke could die, everything that had happened in such a short span of time...it came crashing down on Zelina all at once, and she closed her eyes, feeling the universe rapidly disappearing around her.

"Padmé..." she murmured. "Help...Padmé...pregnant..."

"General...should we...anywhere...can go?" she heard Cruiser's voice calling from the end of the distant tunnel.

"Kryze," Zelina breathed. "Contact Satine Kryze...or...Senator Org...Organa..."

It was all she had left to give before she slipped away once more.